# CVE-2021-47462: mm/mempolicy: do not allow illegal MPOL_F_NUMA_BALANCING | MPOL_LOCAL in mbind()

> A local attacker can trigger a kernel panic via uninitialized memory access in the mbind system call, causing denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 22 May 2024
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47462, GHSA-5573-w6h2-wwx8, UBUNTU-CVE-2021-47462

## What is CVE-2021-47462?

CVE-2021-47462 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 22 May 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

mm/mempolicy: do not allow illegal MPOL_F_NUMA_BALANCING | MPOL_LOCAL in mbind()

syzbot reported access to unitialized memory in mbind() [1]

Issue came with commit bda420b98505 ("numa balancing: migrate on fault
among multiple bound nodes")

This commit added a new bit in MPOL_MODE_FLAGS, but only checked valid
combination (MPOL_F_NUMA_BALANCING can only be used with MPOL_BIND) in
do_set_mempolicy()

This patch moves the check in sanitize_mpol_flags() so that it is also
used by mbind()

  [1]
  BUG: KMSAN: uninit-value in __mpol_equal+0x567/0x590 mm/mempolicy.c:2260
   __mpol_equal+0x567/0x590 mm/mempolicy.c:2260
   mpol_equal include/linux/mempolicy.h:105 [inline]
   vma_merge+0x4a1/0x1e60 mm/mmap.c:1190
   mbind_range+0xcc8/0x1e80 mm/mempolicy.c:811
   do_mbind+0xf42/0x15f0 mm/mempolicy.c:1333
   kernel_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1483 [inline]
   __do_sys_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1490 [inline]
   __se_sys_mbind+0x437/0xb80 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   __x64_sys_mbind+0x19d/0x200 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:51 [inline]
   do_syscall_64+0x54/0xd0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:82
   entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae

  Uninit was created at:
   slab_alloc_node mm/slub.c:3221 [inline]
   slab_alloc mm/slub.c:3230 [inline]
   kmem_cache_alloc+0x751/0xff0 mm/slub.c:3235
   mpol_new mm/mempolicy.c:293 [inline]
   do_mbind+0x912/0x15f0 mm/mempolicy.c:1289
   kernel_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1483 [inline]
   __do_sys_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1490 [inline]
   __se_sys_mbind+0x437/0xb80 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   __x64_sys_mbind+0x19d/0x200 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:51 [inline]
   do_syscall_64+0x54/0xd0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:82
   entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae
  =====================================================
  Kernel panic - not syncing: panic_on_kmsan set ...
  CPU: 0 PID: 15049 Comm: syz-executor.0 Tainted: G    B             5.15.0-rc2-syzkaller #0
  Hardware name: Google Google Compute Engine/Google Compute Engine, BIOS Google 01/01/2011
  Call Trace:
   __dump_stack lib/dump_stack.c:88 [inline]
   dump_stack_lvl+0x1ff/0x28e lib/dump_stack.c:106
   dump_stack+0x25/0x28 lib/dump_stack.c:113
   panic+0x44f/0xdeb kernel/panic.c:232
   kmsan_report+0x2ee/0x300 mm/kmsan/report.c:186
   __msan_warning+0xd7/0x150 mm/kmsan/instrumentation.c:208
   __mpol_equal+0x567/0x590 mm/mempolicy.c:2260
   mpol_equal include/linux/mempolicy.h:105 [inline]
   vma_merge+0x4a1/0x1e60 mm/mmap.c:1190
   mbind_range+0xcc8/0x1e80 mm/mempolicy.c:811
   do_mbind+0xf42/0x15f0 mm/mempolicy.c:1333
   kernel_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1483 [inline]
   __do_sys_mbind mm/mempolicy.c:1490 [inline]
   __se_sys_mbind+0x437/0xb80 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   __x64_sys_mbind+0x19d/0x200 mm/mempolicy.c:1486
   do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:51 [inline]
   do_syscall_64+0x54/0xd0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:82
   entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae

Weakness: CWE-908 (Use of Uninitialized Resource)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-47462?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2021-47462?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2021-47462 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47462 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

- [CVE-2026-53266](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53266/): Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-6282](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-6282/): Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2022-0185](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-0185/): Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-2094](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-2094/): Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2026-53362](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53362/): Linux Kernel Unspecified (high 7.8, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2021-47462 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2021-47462 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 22 May 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47462 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux kernel. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47462/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47462/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-47462
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-47462
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2021-47462

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47462/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.